KC mayor prepares for light rail without Kansans

Ryan D. Wilson/Sun Photo MAYOR Mark Funkhouser asks for regional light rail support at Westwood City Hall Tuesday.

Ryan D. Wilson
Staff Writer





Kansas City, Mo., wants Johnson County on board for a regional light rail plan, but will proceed with Missouri-side supporters only if it must, Mayor Mark Funkhouser told Westwood business leaders Tuesday.

Funkhouser will try to get a question on the November ballot for voters in Platte, Jackson and Clay counties to pass a half-cent sales tax to fund a “Smart Moves” light rail plan.

Wyandotte County can pass a tax for transit without approval from the Kansas Legislature under a bistate transit agreement and optional tax under which buses used to operate.

“There’s room for Wyandotte to join without legislation from Topeka,” Funkhouser said.

Funkhouser said he is 70 percent certain Missouri counties will pass a tax for light rail.

If Wyandotte and Missouri counties do not pass the tax, Funkhouser said he will ask Kansas City voters to fund a starter line on their own. Kansas City voters have turned down a light rail tax seven times, passing Clay Chastain’s light rail plan on the condition it would not be funded by raising taxes.

Kansas City cannot fund a $800 million starter line without regional support, Funkhouser said.

“If you do the math it absolutely does not work for us,” he said.

Kansas City “desperately needs a regional light rail plan” to turn around population loss and severe poverty, including a 40 percent unemployment rate among African-American males, and to preserve the $4.5 billion investment the city has made downtown, Funkhouser said.

“No successful downtown is built on the automobile,” he said. “We can’t afford to let our downtown go. We’re kind of like a poker player, we’re all in.”

Funkhouser said he would continue to tweak the Smart Moves plan and work to make the plan more appealing to Johnson County.

“We’ll continue to make adjustments to try to meet objections (of things) mayors of Johnson County don’t like,” he said. “We’ll keep talking to Johnson County, who frankly is the big dog.”

Funkhouser said by May the city will know whether to proceed with a Missouri-side-only rail initiative. In order to have a rail question on the November ballot, identical language for all counties must be prepared by August.